Ayy MCH has 8 times less clears on the Final Omega than Bard.

[Velhart]

Making Wildfire 11s would be a decent band-aid, but MCH's issues lie in it's core concepts that would take a full revamp of the job. It would likely get this opportunity in the next expansion. This is the last raid tier, so MCH only need to put up with it one more time. If MCH however does become a heavily flawed job that it is now in the upcoming expansion, I may actually jump ship. Which is sad, because I at least like the aesthetic of the job.

[zuzu-bq]

It's not even that MCH is bad. The current iteration of the job is just highly disliked gameplay-wise.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

Even assuming they completely remove disembowel without making any adjustment to brd pdps, brd would more than likely still be meta because of refresh, since in a speedkill environment healers' combined dps is basically as high as a blm's. Refresh alone is worth at least 1k combined healers dps. Which is way claiming that BRD is dependant on DRG is not really correct. It actually is the other way around.

This is actually quite debatable. While Refresh is undoubtedly better, Mana Shift is no slouch either. Without any compensation, Bard will be pulling close to a 1,000 rDPS below Black Mage and 400-500 below Summoner. More than likely Astros will actually use Ewers for MP a bit more and run Casters. I do agree, however, Dragoon is more dependent on Bard than the other way around. In a scenario where only Piercing is removed but Blunt and Slashing remain, Dragoon straight up dies.

[Dualgunner]

This is actually quite debatable. While Refresh is undoubtedly better, Mana Shift is no slouch either.

Mana Shift is only really comparable to Goad. It's Goad, but for Mana instead, and unlike Tactician, Refresh, and Goad, it doesn't generate resource but instead transfers it. To compound, only one caster can really use it without any outwardly negative effects (SMN); in a no-BRD environment, RDM only just barely has the MP economy to sustain its own rotation, and forget Verraise if you're depending on them for Mana Shift; BLM faces potential rotation disruption due to mana ticks if they use Mana Shift at the wrong time, and "the wrong time" is virtually everywhere in their rotation.

All this to say...yes, Mana Shift is a big slouch in my opinion.

[Duskane]

Refresh,Tactician and goad are miles better then mana shift

RDM has awful MP regen so mana shift isnt wise
BLM with manashit effects DPS
Its Okay with SMN but i wouldn't bring a caster for back up MP
Compared to how passive refresh is

[Bourne_Endeavor]

I don't disagree Refresh is better—more significantly so than I stated earlier—however in a scenario where Bard gets a straight 5% nerf, it becomes does Refresh alone outweigh roughly 1,000 rDPS alongside double Mana Shift? Because that is approximately the difference between BLM and a Pierce-less BRD.

And in a speed kill setting, Verraise is out by virtue of no one being allowed to die.

Edit: Decided to dig into this a bit out of curiosity. Found logs from a group that runs BRD without DRG for a better comparison. Here we have BRD pulling just barely ahead of NIN in rDPS, though given the parse they got, this had to be a god tier opener for them. Ignore the MNK since they died this run. Conversely, we have this run where said BRD got obliterated. Obviously, not great examples sizes since both BLM and RDM have been buffed since Sigma, but Alphascape's a bit harder to gauge right now. And it's even harder to find good BRDs who are willing to run without a DRG. I could be wrong, but my gut instinct is BRD will need something to compensate losing Piercing. Not necessarily the full 5% but something. MCH, on the other hand, it... needs a lot of help...

[Duskane]

Yes the job would be fine
Has tons of other utility you yourself has said was good
like troubadour,consistent 2% crit boost,heal buff,Foe requim, the 3 good role skills and it being the "safer" version of Machinist.

Bard not working with pierce is not gonna kill the job,
Especially how so many jobs are crit based again you said crit is the best sub stat atm.

[Dualgunner]

I don't disagree Refresh is significantly better, however in a scenario where Bard gets a straight 5% nerf, it becomes does Refresh alone outweigh roughly 1,000 rDPS alongside double Mana Shift? Because that is approximately the difference between BLM and a Pierce-less BRD.

There will be no RDM, because RDM is anti-caster. So it will be SMN and BLM.
BLM mana shift: 3096 mana shifted to 1 healer. Possible cost: Fire IV (What is that now? Like, 600 total potency?)
SMN mana shift: 2664 mana shifted to 1 healer. Possible cost: Not much as far as I'm aware, since SMN is the best equipped caster to use it.
Mana shift cooldown, 2 minutes.

Refresh: ~6000 MP over the course of 30 seconds to both healers, the Paladin, and any casters in the party. Possible cost: for Bard, foe's, for MCH, none.

Refresh cooldown, 3 minutes.

Every two minutes, SMN BLM can help out with 5,750 mana. Every three minutes, one bard can produce ~12k MP minimum. Least common multiple puts us at 11,500 to ~24k minimum.

Will it equal roughly 1,000 rDPS? I couldn't tell you. Two mana shifting mages however doesn't even really make up for half of what missing one ranger job is capable of on refreshing party members, however.

Edit: Decided to dig into this a bit out of curiosity. Found logs from a group that runs BRD without DRG for a better comparison. Here we have BRD pulling just barely ahead of NIN in rDPS, though given the parse they got, this had to be a god tier opener for them. Ignore the MNK since they died this run. Conversely, we have this run where said BRD got obliterated. Obviously, not great examples sizes since both BLM and RDM have been buffed since Sigma, but Alphascape's a bit harder to gauge right now. And it's even harder to find good BRDs who are willing to run without a DRG.

Why are you bringing up Herokuapp logs, out of curiosity? Even with a DRG in the party, piercing is filtered out for total rDPS and given to the DRG instead.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

Will it equal roughly 1,000 rDPS? I couldn't tell you. Two mana shifting mages however doesn't even really make up for half of what missing one ranger job is capable of on refreshing party members, however.

Suppose this is the question that needs answering. Admittedly, it may be closer than I initially thought.

Why are you bringing up Herokuapp logs, out of curiosity? Even with a DRG in the party, piercing is filtered out for total rDPS and given to the DRG instead.

Mostly curiosity. I wanted to find logs without a DRG, period. I know it filters, so probably not worth the digging, but I was still curious. More over, if DRG also fell out, which is a concern in this discussion, I wanted to see how much MNK/NIN impacts BRD. Since that would also be a factor.

[HyoMinPark]

@HyoMinPark Even assuming they completely remove disembowel without making any adjustment to brd pdps, brd would more than likely still be meta because of refresh, since in a speedkill environment healers' combined dps is basically as high as a blm's. Refresh alone is worth at least 1k combined healers dps. Which is way claiming that BRD is dependant on DRG is not really correct. It actually is the other way around.

It wouldn’t matter—both BLM and SMN are pushing 8,500 and 8,000 DPS respectfully now, and we aren’t even at a point yet where they could have full BiS. On the flip side, BRD is pushing ~7,600, and that’s with the +5% piercing and Litany a DRG gives them. Refresh and the ~1,000 DPS it gives healers wouldn’t matter in a speed kill if you bring a BiS SMN and a BiS BLM, on top of the rest of the raid being BiS; the damage would more than outweigh the BRD that lost a flat 5% damage due to the removal of piercing and any contribution it would give the raid’s healers with Refresh. Speed kills are all about how fast something dies; taking away 5% of a BRD’s damage and giving it no compensation would solidify casters a spot in speed kill groups simply because of how much raw damage both BLM and SMN put out. They would crush a BRD, both with regards to its personal damage and with regards to any rDPS gains it gave a party.

You also misunderstood me when I was speaking on reliance—BRD and DRG are reliant on each other for different reasons—BRD for piercing/Litany and DRG for relevancy—but that doesn’t take away that BRD still relies on DRG for a significant portion of their damage. This is coming from someone who spent 2 tiers without a DRG, so I saw and I know very intimately the difference having piercing and Litany makes for my job.

If piercing is removed with no buff to DRG/BRD/MCH personal damage, all three jobs effectively die. DRG cannot keep up with the other melee—MNK and a good SAM would absolutely destroy it. And the two physical ranged could not keep up with BLM/SMN.

Yes the job would be fine
Has tons of other utility you yourself has said was good
like troubadour,consistent 2% crit boost,heal buff,Foe requim, the 3 good role skills and it being the "safer" version of Machinist.

Doesn’t matter. In a speed kill, casters would outweigh any of the gains from Foe’s and the Passive Crit boost because of their raw damage. If a job’s raw damage can offset any rDPS or utility gains of a utility job, the selfish DPS job automatically wins.

We’re talking about speed kills; not things like progression. SMN has already pushed MCH out of speed kills—has since 4.1.

Bard not working with pierce is not gonna kill the job,
Especially how so many jobs are crit based again you said crit is the best sub stat atm.

It would most certainly suffer—have you ever seen the damage a BRD does without a DRG? It’s the lowest of all DPS, and DRG-less damage is not stellar by any means. I raided for two tiers without a DRG, so I’m very much familiar with how much I gain from having one (and how much I lose from not having one).

It would not be able to compete with BLM and SMN as they stand now. The only reason it does currently is due to it’s personal DPS with a DRG (also in part thanks to critical hit scaling this tier) and its utility. But removing 5% flat damage would cause the casters to start pulling ahead easily, especially in a speed kill environment.

Your assumption of crit would have to rely on it continuing to be the strongest substat by a mile for this statement to work. Critical hit is the best substat now—that wasn’t the case at the beginning of the expansion where Direct Hit scaled better for all jobs save for MNK and BRD. But now it’s reached the point where we can stack enough crit to make it the better scaling substat over D.Hit.